First posted try at widefield, LMC

[raymo]

2 x 30secs @ 400 ISO 50mm.
Don't know why 200kb image uploaded as 81kb.
raymo

[Atmos]

Looks like a good field of view raymo.
If it loaded as being a couple of kb over the site may have compressed it further to bring it below that mark. All I can think of.

[Robert9]

Lovely crisp image Raymo. :thumbsup:
Robert

[blink138]

did you piggyback on your unruly mount raymo?
pat

[raymo]

Thank you all. Yes, piggybacked on the beast. I posted another repro for you [ M83] Pat, but you must have missed it, or didn't think it was worth
commenting on. The diagonal lines in this image are awful, I'll slightly
downsize another copy and post it. Thanks Colin, I'll make sure not to do that again.

have posted better copy, but unable to remove inferior one because it
doesn't show up as an attachment.
raymo

[blink138]

this one is much better raymo, i noticed on your orion shot that you done 60s exposures, is that the limit of your mount now?
i must have missed the m83!

[LightningNZ]

Nice work Raymo. I think there's a little bit more left in your image - don't feel that you have to make the background absolutely black. There's signal in that there noise. ;)

Cheers,
Cam

[raymo]

Thanks Pat; I had got frustrated with the mount, so I just did a one star alignment, and tried a quick bit of imaging. A few nights earlier I got a few subs at 180 secs. If and when I get the beast working properly I
should manage 400-500 secs, which is a bit more than the sky here will
permit anyway. The M83 repro is 14 items back on this page.

There was quite a gradient on this image Cam, caused by stray light, so,
as I still haven't come to grips with gradient removal, I just hid it by
darkening the background. I'm in more or less the same boat as Leon,
having given up on trying to get my head around anything more than the most basic processing.
raymo

[blink138]

raymo did i read that you take your mount in every use?
why dont you buy a bbq cover and leave it outside, get the best pa possible and then rebalance the ota every use?, it would save some headache surely?
then you could spend minimum time tweaking the pa every use
any way at 50mm you could easily get 90s subs and stop the lens down a little
where are the gradients coming from?; light pollution??
pat

[raymo]

I have two reasons why I don't leave it set up Pat. SWMBO won't have a bar of it sitting on the end of our patio, which is the only place that I can escape from street lights.
I put my BBQ cover over it one night, and in the morning every inch of the scope, mount, and tripod was absolutely streaming with condensation; a good job I took the H/C and cable indoors. I had to remove all the bolts and dry them before they rusted.
Gradients are from four streetlights, and from the lights of town in the west. I have a filter, but it doesn't do much at all with modern
streetlights.
raymo

[blink138]

raymo i put a big plastic clear bag over mine first and then the bbq cover, never had a problem
i did, like you have a problem with my "bread knife" but we havn't invested our money for it to lay idle in the lounge room now have we?
must be a solution to blocking the street lights surely mate? i used to put up my free standing umbrella between my scope and a street light in the next street for instance!
pat